Papacy and the Atlantic World
- LAST REVIEWED: 28 December 2022
- LAST MODIFIED: 19 December 2012
- DOI: 10.1093/obo/9780199730414-0150
- LAST REVIEWED: 28 December 2022
- LAST MODIFIED: 19 December 2012
- DOI: 10.1093/obo/9780199730414-0150
Introduction
The early modern papacy (c. 1500–1800) constituted a vast bureaucracy (sometimes called the Holy See or the Vatican) inherited from the medieval church and dedicated to asserting papal authority throughout the Catholic world. The pope dictated Catholic religious orthodoxy and oversaw a network of church offices that controlled the activities of theologians, the clergy, European monarchs, and individual believers. The discovery of the New World and the opening of sub-Saharan Africa to European traders in the 15th century rapidly expanded the boundaries of the Christian world and brought with it new political and religious challenges for the papacy. Papal officials disseminated information on new discoveries in the Atlantic, provided a theoretical framework to justify conquest and colonization, and ensured that the promotion of the Catholic faith lay at the heart of Spanish and Portuguese expansion. Key colonial institutions—such as the patronato real and the Inquisition—firmly bound temporal authority in the Atlantic world to the spiritual authority of the papacy. Under the leadership of Gregory XIII (1572–1585), the papacy instituted a series of reforms that sought to strengthen Vatican control of the church and revitalize the Catholic faith. Based on the findings of the Council of Trent (1545–1563), these new reforms standardized Catholic practices, reigned in the abuses of the clergy, and promoted missionary endeavors across the globe. The Catholic Church had long viewed the conversion of non-Christian peoples as an essential aspect of the church’s civilizing mission. By the late 16th and 17th centuries, revitalized missionary orders, sponsored and supported by the papacy, targeted Catholic, Protestant, and non-Christian populations in an attempt to expand the Catholic faith and ensure the political and cultural dominance of Catholicism. Papal attempts to coordinate and control this international program of missionary expansion culminated in the creation, in 1622, of the Sacred Congregation for the Propagation of the Faith, or Propaganda Fide. The increasing emphasis placed on missionary activities and the civilizing mission of the early modern church placed the papacy at the center of key European debates over the justification of conquest, the treatment of colonized peoples, and the enslavement of non-Christians in the Atlantic world.
General Overviews
Two recent synthetic articles, Armstrong 2007 and Greer and Mills 2007, offer general readers, students, and scholars alike an excellent introduction to the topic of the papacy and the Atlantic world. Together, these works provide a broad geographic overview of Catholic activity in the region, survey the current historiography, and suggest key areas for scholarly research. Readers should also consult the works cited in the Oxford Bibliographies articles on Catholicism, Religion, and Missionaries. For readers unfamiliar with the broader history of the papacy, there are a number of well-written general histories by leading scholars in the field that survey the topic from the period of the early Christian Church through the modern day. Originally conceived as an accompaniment to a televised history of the papacy, Duffy 2006 provides a comprehensive and accessible narrative of the subject that stresses the significance of the institution of the papacy to world history. O’Malley 2010 focuses on the pivotal role played by individual popes in shaping the institution of the papacy and the Catholic Church as a whole. Norwich 2011 approaches the history of the papacy from the perspective of the institution’s long entanglement with European and global politics.
Armstrong, Megan. “Transatlantic Catholicism: Rethinking the Nature of the Catholic Tradition in the Early Modern Period.” History Compass 5.6 (2007): 1942–1966.
DOI: 10.1111/j.1478-0542.2007.00483.xSave Citation »Export Citation » Share Citation »
Stresses the global nature of Catholic expansion in the early modern period. Argues for more comparative study of Catholic tradition and its influence on cultural development throughout the Atlantic world.
Duffy, Eamon. Saints and Sinners: A History of the Popes. 3d ed. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 2006.
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A well-balanced narrative history of the papacy. The first half of this text is devoted to the medieval period and the second to developments from 1500 onwards. This new edition contains additional chapters on recent papal history. Includes color illustrations.
Greer, Allan, and Kenneth Mills. “A Catholic Atlantic.” In The Atlantic in Global History, 1500–2000. Edited by Jorge Cañizares-Esguerra and Erik R. Seeman, 3–19. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Pearson Prentice Hall, 2007.
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Surveys the growing historiography on the expansion of the Catholic Church and Catholic Christianity in the Atlantic world. Suggests the importance of an Atlantic approach to understanding the development of religious traditions in the Americas.
Norwich, John Julius. Absolute Monarchs: A History of the Papacy. New York: Random House, 2011.
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A popular history focused on the diplomatic and political aspects of papal history. Highly critical of the modern Catholic Church’s social and cultural politics.
O’Malley, John W. A History of the Popes: From Peter to the Present. Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield, 2010.
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A clear and concise survey of papal history focused on the individual contributions of several popes who played a critical role in the development of the Catholic Church. Designed for use by undergraduate students and non-Catholic readers.
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Article
- Abolition of Slavery
- Abolitionism and Africa
- Africa and the Atlantic World
- African American Religions
- African Religion and Culture
- African Retailers and Small Artisans in the Atlantic World
- Age of Atlantic Revolutions, The
- Alexander von Humboldt and Transatlantic Studies
- America, Pre-Contact
- American Revolution, The
- Anti-Catholicism and Anti-Popery
- Argentina
- Army, British
- Arsenals
- Art and Artists
- Atlantic Biographies
- Atlantic Creoles
- Atlantic History and Hemispheric History
- Atlantic Migration
- Atlantic New Orleans: 18th and 19th Centuries
- Atlantic Trade and the British Economy
- Atlantic Trade and the European Economy
- Bacon's Rebellion
- Baltic Sea
- Baptists
- Barbados in the Atlantic World
- Barbary States
- Benguela
- Berbice in the Atlantic World
- Black Atlantic in the Age of Revolutions, The
- Bolívar, Simón
- Borderlands
- Brazil
- Brazil and Africa
- Britain and Empire, 1685-1730
- British Atlantic Architectures
- British Atlantic World
- Buenos Aires in the Atlantic World
- Cabato, Giovanni (John Cabot)
- Cannibalism
- Capitalism
- Captain John Smith
- Captivity
- Captivity in Africa
- Captivity in North America
- Caribbean, The
- Cartier, Jacques
- Castas
- Catholicism
- Cattle in the Atlantic World
- Central American Independence
- Central Europe and the Atlantic World
- Charleston
- Chartered Companies, British and Dutch
- Cherokee
- Childhood
- Chinese Indentured Servitude in the Atlantic World
- Chocolate
- Church and Slavery
- Cities and Urbanization in Portuguese America
- Citizenship in the Atlantic World
- Class and Social Structure
- Climate
- Clothing
- Coastal/Coastwide Trade
- Cod in the Atlantic World
- Coffee
- Colonial Governance in Spanish America
- Colonial Governance in the Atlantic World
- Colonialism and Postcolonialism
- Colonization, Ideologies of
- Colonization of English America
- Communications in the Atlantic World
- Comparative Indigenous History of the Americas
- Confraternities
- Constitutions
- Continental America
- Cook, Captain James
- Cotton
- Credit and Debt
- Creek Indians in the Atlantic World, The
- Creolization
- Criminal Transportation in the Atlantic World
- Crowds in the Atlantic World
- Cuba
- Currency
- Death in the Atlantic World
- Demography of the Atlantic World
- Diaspora, Jewish
- Diaspora, The Acadian
- Disease in the Atlantic World
- Domestic Production and Consumption in the Atlantic World
- Domestic Slave Trades in the Americas
- Dreams and Dreaming
- Dutch Atlantic World
- Dutch Brazil
- Dutch Caribbean and Guianas, The
- Early Modern France
- Economy and Consumption in the Atlantic World
- Economy of British America, The
- Edwards, Jonathan
- Elites
- Emancipation
- Emotions
- Empire and State Formation
- Enlightenment, The
- Environment and the Natural World
- Ethnicity
- Europe and Africa
- Europe and the Atlantic World, Northern
- Europe and the Atlantic World, Western
- European, Javanese and African and Indentured Servitude in...
- Evangelicalism and Conversion
- Female Slave Owners
- Feminism
- First Contact and Early Colonization of Brazil
- Fiscality
- Fiscal-Military State
- Food
- Forts, Fortresses, and Fortifications
- France and Empire
- France and its Empire in the Indian Ocean
- France and the British Isles from 1640 to 1789
- Free People of Color
- Free Ports in the Atlantic World
- French Army and the Atlantic World, The
- French Atlantic World
- French Emancipation
- French Revolution, The
- Gardens
- Gender in Iberian America
- Gender in North America
- Gender in the Atlantic World
- Gender in the Caribbean
- George Montagu Dunk, Second Earl of Halifax
- Georgia in the Atlantic World
- Germans in the Atlantic World
- Giovanni da Verrazzano, Explorer
- Glasgow
- Glorious Revolution
- Godparents and Godparenting
- Great Awakening
- Green Atlantic: the Irish in the Atlantic World
- Guianas, The
- Haitian Revolution, The
- Hanoverian Britain
- Havana in the Atlantic World
- Hinterlands of the Atlantic World
- Histories and Historiographies of the Atlantic World
- Honor
- Huguenots
- Hunger and Food Shortages
- Iberian Atlantic World, 1600-1800
- Iberian Empires, 1600-1800
- Iberian Inquisitions
- Idea of Atlantic History, The
- Impact of the French Revolution on the Caribbean, The
- Indentured Servitude
- Indentured Servitude in the Atlantic World, Indian
- India, The Atlantic Ocean and
- Indigenous Knowledge
- Indigo in the Atlantic World
- Insurance
- Internal Slave Migrations in the Americas
- Interracial Marriage in the Atlantic World
- Ireland and the Atlantic World
- Iroquois (Haudenosaunee)
- Islam and the Atlantic World
- Itinerant Traders, Peddlers, and Hawkers
- Jamaica in the Atlantic World
- Jefferson, Thomas
- Jesuits
- Jews and Blacks
- Labor Systems
- Land and Propert in the Atlantic World
- Language, State, and Empire
- Languages, Caribbean Creole
- Latin American Independence
- Law and Slavery
- Legal Culture
- Leisure in the British Atlantic World
- Letters and Letter Writing
- Lima
- Literature and Culture
- Literature of the British Caribbean
- Literature, Slavery and Colonization
- Liverpool in The Atlantic World 1500-1833
- Louverture, Toussaint
- Loyalism
- Lutherans
- Mahogany
- Manumission
- Maps in the Atlantic World
- Maritime Atlantic in the Age of Revolutions, The
- Markets in the Atlantic World
- Maroons and Marronage
- Marriage and Family in the Atlantic World
- Material Culture in the Atlantic World
- Material Culture of Slavery in the British Atlantic
- Medicine in the Atlantic World
- Mennonites
- Mental Disorder in the Atlantic World
- Mercantilism
- Merchants in the Atlantic World
- Merchants' Networks
- Mestizos
- Mexico
- Migrations and Diasporas
- Minas Gerais
- Miners
- Mining, Gold, and Silver
- Missionaries
- Missionaries, Native American
- Money and Banking in the Atlantic Economy
- Monroe, James
- Moravians
- Morris, Gouverneur
- Music and Music Making
- Napoléon Bonaparte and the Atlantic World
- Nation and Empire in Northern Atlantic History
- Nation, Nationhood, and Nationalism
- Native American Histories in North America
- Native American Networks
- Native American Religions
- Native Americans and Africans
- Native Americans and the American Revolution
- Native Americans and the Atlantic World
- Native Americans in Cities
- Native Americans in Europe
- Native North American Women
- Native Peoples of Brazil
- Natural History
- Networks for Migrations and Mobility
- Networks of Science and Scientists
- New England in the Atlantic World
- New France and Louisiana
- New York City
- News
- Nineteenth-Century Atlantic World
- Nineteenth-Century France
- North Africa and the Atlantic World
- Northern New Spain
- Novel in the Age of Revolution, The
- Oceanic History
- Oceans
- Pacific, The
- Paine, Thomas
- Papacy and the Atlantic World
- Paris
- People of African Descent in Early Modern Europe
- Peru
- Pets and Domesticated Animals in the Atlantic World
- Philadelphia
- Philanthropy
- Piracy
- Plantations in the Atlantic World
- Plants
- Political Participation in the Nineteenth Century Atlantic...
- Polygamy and Bigamy
- Port Cities, British
- Port Cities, British American
- Port Cities, French
- Port Cities, French American
- Port Cities, Iberian
- Ports, African
- Portugal and Brazile in the Age of Revolutions
- Portugal, Early Modern
- Portuguese Atlantic World
- Poverty in the Early Modern English Atlantic
- Pre-Columbian Transatlantic Voyages
- Pregnancy and Reproduction
- Print Culture in the British Atlantic
- Proprietary Colonies
- Protestantism
- Puritanism
- Quakers
- Quebec and the Atlantic World, 1760–1867
- Quilombos
- Race and Racism
- Race, The Idea of
- Reconstruction, Democracy, and United States Imperialism
- Red Atlantic
- Refugees, Saint-Domingue
- Religion
- Religion and Colonization
- Religion in the British Civil Wars
- Religious Border-Crossing
- Religious Networks
- Representations of Slavery
- Republicanism
- Rice in the Atlantic World
- Rio de Janeiro
- Rum
- Rumor
- Russia and North America
- Sailors
- Saint Domingue
- Saint-Louis, Senegal
- Salvador da Bahia
- Scandinavian Chartered Companies
- Science, History of
- Scotland and the Atlantic World
- Sea Creatures in the Atlantic World
- Second-Hand Trade
- Settlement and Region in British America, 1607-1763
- Seven Years' War, The
- Seville
- Sex and Sexuality in the Atlantic World
- Shakers
- Shakespeare and the Atlantic World
- Ships and Shipping
- Signares
- Silk
- Slave Codes
- Slave Names and Naming in the Anglophone Atlantic
- Slave Owners In The British Atlantic
- Slave Rebellions
- Slave Resistance in the Atlantic World
- Slave Trade and Natural Science, The
- Slave Trade, The Atlantic
- Slavery and Empire
- Slavery and Fear
- Slavery and Gender
- Slavery and the Family
- Slavery, Atlantic
- Slavery, Health, and Medicine
- Slavery in Africa
- Slavery in Brazil
- Slavery in British America
- Slavery in British and American Literature
- Slavery in Danish America
- Slavery in Dutch America and the West Indies
- Slavery in New England
- Slavery in North America, The Growth and Decline of
- Slavery in the Cape Colony, South Africa
- Slavery in the French Atlantic World
- Slavery, Native American
- Slavery, Public Memory and Heritage of
- Slavery, The Origins of
- Slavery, Urban
- Smuggling
- São Paulo
- Sociability in the British Atlantic
- Society for the Propagation of the Gospel in Foreign Parts...
- Soldiers
- South Atlantic
- South Atlantic Creole Archipelagos South Atlantic Creole A...
- South Carolina
- Sovereignty and the Law
- Spain, Early Modern
- Spanish America After Independence, 1825-1900
- Spanish American Port Cities
- Spanish Colonization to 1650
- Subjecthood in the Atlantic World
- Sugar in the Atlantic World
- Technology, Inventing, and Patenting
- Textiles in the Atlantic World
- Texts, Printing, and the Book
- The American West
- The French Lesser Antilles
- The Fur Trade
- Theater
- Time(scapes) in the Atlantic World
- Tobacco
- Toleration in the Atlantic World
- Transatlantic Political Economy
- Tudor and Stuart Britain in the Wider World, 1485-1685
- Universities
- USA and Empire in the 19th Century
- Venezuela and the Atlantic World
- Violence
- Visual Art and Representation
- War and Trade
- War of 1812
- War of the Spanish Succession
- Warfare
- Warfare in Spanish America
- Warfare in 17th-Century North America
- Warfare, Medicine, and Disease in the Atlantic World
- Weavers
- West Indian Economic Decline
- Whitefield, George
- Whiteness in the Atlantic World
- Wine
- Witchcraft in the Atlantic World
- Women and the Law
- Women Prophets